Bengaluru: AICCTU says government should help migrant workers reach their homes

Bengaluru: The All India Central Council of Trade Unions (AICCTU) in a letter to Chief Secretary P Ravi Kumar , Gajanan Mallya, General Manager of South Western Railway and the labour secretary, has requested that assistance should be provided to any worker who desires to return to their native place.

It demanded setting up of a specific helpline for migrant workers with operators who are fluent in Kannada and Hindi languages.

One of the major concerns which AICCTU has brought is that though the government, unlike the first lockdown, has not completely stopped the movement of trains, the railways has progressively been cancelling trains from April onwards.

"Whereas it was recently reported that as many as 72 trains had been cancelled by the South Western Railway subsequent to the Karnataka lockdown, a number of other zones have also been cancelling trains.

For example, recently, the Southern Railways has also cancelled 50 trains. It may be remembered that during the first lockdown, there were over 9 lakh stranded migrant workers in Karnataka, and the migrant crisis reached unprecedented levels. At that time, special Shramik trains were operated, and orders were issued that the expenses were to be borne by the State," the letter said.

Though the crisis has not reached such a level as in the first lockdown , a failure of the State to take proactive measures could result in a similar disaster.

Already, over 60,000 intra state migrants have returned to their villages in Karnataka and reports show that inter state migrant workers are also leaving Bengalum in droves.